Will *any* mobile OS emerge dominant by 2015?

I think It would definitely help, but I won't go so far as to say they'd sell as well as the competition, since the competition is executing masterfully at this point. But I feel it would definitely help them sell more than they are now, because based on Andy Rubin's comments their tablets are selling extremely poorly. Any improvement is welcome at this point, and needed.

The problem for Google is that fixing these problems will take time, foresight, and execution. All the while the competition continues to cement its lead.

Another problem for Google is that they're now in the position of having to compete against a device built on their own platform (the Fire) before they can even get around to competing with the 800lb gorilla in the room in the iPad. But it can also be looked at another way; the Fire has taught Google and the OEMs the right target to shoot for, the low priced category.

So do you think if the tablet ecosystem improves Android tablets will sell as well or better than the competition?

Why wouldn't it?

If things improve, then it's almost axiomatic that sales would be better.

I can tell you this, there is a significant "channels" problem with Android tablets. Most retailers just throw it out there and expect minimum wage sales folk to make a "go" of it. It's just another product. They sell it with about the same effort as they put into deodorant.

A lot of this might turn around if there were more venues where the product was better explained to incoming consumers.

I mean, have you ever seen a tablet being "marketed" at a place like Office Depot? Meanwhile, you can't go to a mall without tripping over a kiosk where knowledgeable folk are there to explain Android phones to you.

I think that fact absolutely accounts for much of the difference, yeah.

Apple has the Apple stores, Amazon has their extremely popular and informative online storefront. Android OEMs have nothing.

No, it's really just price. The Nook color and Fire sold because they were cheaper than ipad. Galaxy Tab/Xoom not only weren't cheaper, they were more expensive, which is insane.

Android superphones work because our lizard brains equate bigger=better and carriers have a lot of strategies and incentives for pushing handsets. So in that sense, the retailers let the Androids down, sure. But Android doesn't really compete head to head with iOS and I don't think the OEMs understood that when they made the tablets.

No, it's really just price. The Nook color and Fire sold because they were cheaper than ipad

Price is a feature. But, not the only one.

The Fire has a complete value proposition going for it and a retailer that knows how to sell on-line. Nobody buying a Fire gets one first and wonders what to do with it afterwards.

It is a sample size of one, but I can tell you that B&N does a good job of marketing the Nook at "retail" -- in its traditional, one-on-one sense.

In my wife (the techno-phobe's) case Nook had several things going for it:

1. She has loved Barnes and Noble for years -- she identifies with the brand; means something to her. (I imagine a lot of folks have some sort of relationship like this with Amazon).2. When she went to the local B&N store to ask about it, she got individual attention not unlike what Apple might have done, except they spoke her language -- the language of book readers.3. They even had a "how to use it" class they ran once a day for not just owners but prospects. In my wife's case, she happened to pick an evening where she was the only one there. Again, a lot of support, a lot of individual attention.

All of this mattered to her. She was genuinely puzzled (for instance) as to whether to do the Color or a more basic tablet.

Now, for all of that, Fire is selling even better. But, while I'm not an Amazon expert, they know something about selling and I don't think the experience is the same as going to newegg and picking something out of a lineup.

Quote:

Android superphones work because our lizard brains equate bigger=better and carriers have a lot of strategies and incentives for pushing handsets.

Which ought to work for tablets. The difference in the phone case just might be the sales support. People are finding out, somehow, "what kind of phone they are." These are not toaster ovens; even given people own PCs, these things need some explaining. People aren't just going to these stores and buying the cheapest, which is what happens when there's not much in the way of sales support.

Heck, I'm as geeky as they come and they have to be explained to me.

To the extent there is no sales support for tablets, all they will have is price. You are right that far for sure. But, in my one desperate summer as a salesperson, I learned that price was the last thing a company wanted to rely on.

I'll buy that, but if the ecosystem *is* Android, and that ecosystem is not selling tablets, why are phones selling well while tablets are the doing disproportionately terrible?

Except they aren't. They are growing faster than ipad and will pass them at some point (unless W8 stops them). REmember--Apple only sold about 1.5x as many last quarter. There was a year or two when iPhone outsold Android. and it grew and grew and grew and eventually passed iPhone. Same trend is happenign with Android tablets.

Aren't we about due to give this argument a rest? You can only stuff the channel so long; retailers are not warehouses. This can only be done for a quarter or so before everyone gives up on any sort of "inventory stuffing as an illusion of sales." Which, in any case, impresses nobody that counts (does the general consumer even know if a channel is being stuffed to create the illusion of progress? How do they find out?). The retailers involved certainly aren't fooled; so who benefits here?

At best, this distinction can only fool us and that only for a limited time.

The only case I can remember where this was really and unequivocally true was the whole HP fiasco and we learned the truth on that one very, very quickly.

If that is the standard, then we're already overdue for the fire sales. If not, we'll be reeducated shortly.

At a very close in point, this argument is going to have to be rated as part of Android Derangement Syndrome.

Do you expect shit brands like Asus, Vizio, Archos, and Velocity to have fire sales? They're not shipping numbers close to what HP did with the TouchPad.

Then that suggests that inventory is roughly in line with sales anyway, plus a relatively constant buffer.

I expect that anything in the inventory is going to be dispensed with if it doesn't sell. The retailers aren't going to simply sit on them forever. Unless that's happening, then the "sold versus shipped" business is just a sideshow. No sales means "sell through" will stop.

Now, if you want to believe these things are going to go back silently, in some sort of "secret return project" I submit that isn't realistic.

What's far more likely to happen is what pretty much always happens when there's slow sales -- "inventory reduction sales" and they will resemble fire sales. Prices will be slashed. That's what happens to the dogs that don't sell.

What won't happen is that the sales channel will have an infinite capacity for these things. so that we will be long fooled about actual sales. They are either going to be sold or returned and we'll certainly find out about it whichever it is.

One thing that will happen is that retailers will stop stocking them if their inventory is way out of line with sales. Someone suggested that the tablet makers can "buy" (or, realistically "rent") shelf space with the retailers, but that simply can't continue forever. There's always something else out there that's actually, you know, selling. Retailers aren't warehouses in the long run (even in the not so long run). They don't make their money from inventory. They make money from selling stuff. Buying space reduces retailer's costs -- it doesn't really make them much if any money.

A lot of these retailers have no special love for these things anyway -- it's just another product to them. They'll dump and move on. They have no reason not to tell the truth about it, either.

I don't know what you mean by LTD (life to date?) but if you expect sales to increase, why harp on the distinction of shipped versus sales (when even Apple counts by "shipped")? It's a sideshow even if many want to make something more out of it than it can be. It was used in the phone days to deny the obvious -- and it ended up with the same "who cares" fate.

Apple does count shipped, but their inventory sells through, so counting shipped in that instance is equal to counting sold. The same cannot be said of Android tablets based on Andy Rubin's given numbers.

Apple does count shipped, but their inventory sells through, so counting shipped in that instance is equal to counting sold. The same cannot be said of Android tablets based on Andy Rubin's given numbers.

Android superphones work because our lizard brains equate bigger=better and carriers have a lot of strategies and incentives for pushing handsets.

I can't wait for the iPhone 5 with its 4.3-4.6" screen and how it will be decried as "too big" by all the Apple fans.

++

It's going to be a hoot to read all the posts about how bigger than 3.5" is now good, and smaller than whatever the new size is is now bad.

People's complaints, as usual, is because there's constantly people saying Apple has to make a bigger screen, has to create a netbook, etc. etc. Apple clearly doesn't have to do anything and those who say they do will continue to be wrong.

Android superphones work because our lizard brains equate bigger=better and carriers have a lot of strategies and incentives for pushing handsets.

I can't wait for the iPhone 5 with its 4.3-4.6" screen and how it will be decried as "too big" by all the Apple fans.

++

It's going to be a hoot to read all the posts about how bigger than 3.5" is now good, and smaller than whatever the new size is is now bad.

People's complaints, as usual, is because there's constantly people saying Apple has to make a bigger screen, has to create a netbook, etc. etc. Apple clearly doesn't have to do anything and those who say they do will continue to be wrong.

Well there are tech bloggers claiming Apple won't do a larger screen because the current size is perfect ergonomically. For example, Gruber will be forced to admit at some point that the larger screen size on the next iPhone is a massive improvement over the smaller size. Because the alternative would be to stick to his guns and say that Apple made a mistake. And Apple doesn't make mistakes.

Android superphones work because our lizard brains equate bigger=better and carriers have a lot of strategies and incentives for pushing handsets.

I can't wait for the iPhone 5 with its 4.3-4.6" screen and how it will be decried as "too big" by all the Apple fans.

++

It's going to be a hoot to read all the posts about how bigger than 3.5" is now good, and smaller than whatever the new size is is now bad.

People's complaints, as usual, is because there's constantly people saying Apple has to make a bigger screen, has to create a netbook, etc. etc. Apple clearly doesn't have to do anything and those who say they do will continue to be wrong.

Heh, thats one way of looking at it. Hey, here's a our new larger iPhone that we didn't have to make, but we did just because.

Nothing on the Google quarterly call on Android really. Page had a lame, non-answer response when asked about their Android tablet strategy. So, as it stands, 12 million Android tablets activated aka sold through ever. BFD.

Nothing on the Google quarterly call on Android really. Page had a lame, non-answer response when asked about their Android tablet strategy. So, as it stands, 12 million Android tablets activated aka sold through ever. BFD.

WRT bigger iPhone screens the current rumor/speculation is that to preserve dpi and interface element sizing that it would make sense to keep the screen the same width of 640 and boost the height of the screen to 1152. This would make it 3.99 inches and they could keep it in almost the same sized package they currently have. It would be pretty close to 16:9 which I don't love for portrait devices but it does solve a lot of problems with packaging a 4 inch screen in an iPhone and the iPhones traditional 3:2 ratio has always been a bit oddball anyway so It's not like they don't have a history of being outside the box in this way.

Android superphones work because our lizard brains equate bigger=better and carriers have a lot of strategies and incentives for pushing handsets.

I can't wait for the iPhone 5 with its 4.3-4.6" screen and how it will be decried as "too big" by all the Apple fans.

Stop trolling!

It isn't trolling.

It is trolling.You're being sarcastic - you don't mean that people will decry a theoretical 4" iPhone as too big. You mean that they will lovingly accept it as being the best thing ever and forget everything they said about Android phones being too big.You're belittling people for being hypocritical, for theoretically going back on opinions held now, due to the introduction of a theoretical new product."All the Apple fans" is a strawman. The amount of millions of people who now buy Apple products isn't simply "all the Apple fans" any more.

Android superphones work because our lizard brains equate bigger=better and carriers have a lot of strategies and incentives for pushing handsets.

I can't wait for the iPhone 5 with its 4.3-4.6" screen and how it will be decried as "too big" by all the Apple fans.

++

It's going to be a hoot to read all the posts about how bigger than 3.5" is now good, and smaller than whatever the new size is is now bad.

I always think of tons of people online defending the iPod for not having video. It was a gimmick. It killed battery, the screen was too small, etc. Then the iPod got video and over night it was all of a sudden magical.

I always think of tons of people online defending the iPod for not having video. It was a gimmick. It killed battery, the screen was too small, etc. Then the iPod got video and over night it was all of a sudden magical.

There was nothing "magical" about pictures on the iPod Classic. It was ridiculously bad for anything but showing album covers.

Android superphones work because our lizard brains equate bigger=better and carriers have a lot of strategies and incentives for pushing handsets.

I can't wait for the iPhone 5 with its 4.3-4.6" screen and how it will be decried as "too big" by all the Apple fans.

++

It's going to be a hoot to read all the posts about how bigger than 3.5" is now good, and smaller than whatever the new size is is now bad.

I always think of tons of people online defending the iPod for not having video. It was a gimmick. It killed battery, the screen was too small, etc. Then the iPod got video and over night it was all of a sudden magical.

In fact, not sure video on iPad is so great unless you're on a long flight and you want to watch something that the plane doesn't offer (usually they have more current movies available).

They got video because the SOCs now used for mobile devices have silicon for decoding. Great and nice to have but I rarely watch videos on the iPhone. Instead, any shows and movies I wait until I'm in front of my big screen with surround sound.

If I had a long commute on a train or bus or subway, I can see more of a use for video on the go. But I would more likely just listen to podcasts or audio books.

Video iPod is awesome for in car entertainment systems. Apple should have gone full bore with that, honestly: In car stereo system with built in AirPlay, perhaps AppleTV, 720p LCD, dock connectors, and wifi for $1k.

In fact, not sure video on iPad is so great unless you're on a long flight and you want to watch something that the plane doesn't offer (usually they have more current movies available).

I think this is way off.

First off, I've seen (on my more recent flights) a pronounced tendency for people to do just that -- watch movies on their iPads.

Moreover, we've had in-flight DVDs available for a long time and they are quite popular. People buy or rent -- can still rent -- DVDs and players for themselves or the kids to watch on planes. Probably similar to the ones you see on the rear of parent's seats so the kiddies can watch something on the way to the store. Not to mention those that watch movies on their laptop.

And, let's face it, movie selection on airplanes has long been pretty much something under the center of the bell shaped curve in terms of appeal. I have enjoyed relatively few in-flight movies. Even more seldom has it been a movie I would have crossed the street to see.

Well I don't have an iPad yet but I've borrowed one once or twice, loaded it up with some movies and then just mainly slept or did something else. One of these times was in business class, with an AC outlet and Wifi handy.

Only time I wanted to watch while on a trip was last June, when I went to Italy and wanted to catch the season finale of GAme of Thrones just after it aired. Had it on the DVR back home but wanted to see it. Well HBO Go is blocked outside the US and I didn't want to pay for some VPN service.

Certainly other people take different kinds of trips, lounging all day by the hotel pool or at a beach resort. Then the appeal of videos and ebooks make sense.

And certainly you see a lot of people with mobile devices on airplanes now. They seem to be gradually displacing the laptops people open up while on long flights. I don't doubt that video and (even games) are popular on tablets. Just that it's not a big draw for me.

The flights I've been on have mostly current movies, long before they're available on video. Even movies I wouldn't go out of my way to see but have a curiosity about, I don't mind watching on flights, because it doesn't cost me anything additional and I have some time to kill. The movies I own, which I could load on an iPad, I could also watch on my big screen and usually do.

So why the skepticism if you clearly see other people using it for video, games, books, etc?

Kids are a classic example of wanting to watch the exact same thing multiple times because they are happy knowing they will get the ending they want, the characters they like, and the story they remember. Endless hours of watching the same show every car ride, or flight, or at the waiting room is not a problem. Keeping 10 DVDs in the car is kind of hard, especially once they get scratched. Keeping 50 movies on an iPod, or 10 movies on an iPad, is easy and convenient.